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Test Bank for Accounting Information Systems 2nd


Edition by Richardson Chang and Smith

True / False Questions:


© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
1. Accounting and Finance is a primary activity in the value chain.
Answer: FALSE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-04 Describe how business processes affect the firm’s value chain.
Topic: The Value Chain and Accounting Information Systems

2. Accounting Information Systems at this date are all computerized.


Answer: FALSE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-02 Distinguish between data, information and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information

3. Business value includes all those items, events and interactions that determine the financial health and
well-being of the firm.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-04 Describe how business processes affect the firm’s value chain.
Topic: The Value Chain and Accounting Information Systems

4. The Certified Information Technology Professional (CITP) is a professional designation for those with a
broad range of technology knowledge and does not require a CPA.
Answer: FALSE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-03 Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems
Topic: Role of Accountants in Accounting Information Systems

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
5. The Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA) is a professional designation generally sought by
those performing IT audits.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-03 Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems
Topic: Role of Accountants in Accounting Information Systems

6. Information is defined as being data organized in a meaningful way that is useful to the user.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-02 Distinguish between data, information and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information

7. Data is defined as being information organized in a meaningful way that is useful to the user.
Answer: FALSE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-02 Distinguish between data, information and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information

8. A systems analyst analyzes a business problem that might be addressed by an information system and
recommends software or systems to address that problem.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-04 Describe how business processes affect the firm’s value chain.
Topic: The Value Chain and Accounting Information Systems

9. A value chain is defined as the flow of materials, information, payments, and services from customer
to supplier.
Answer: FALSE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-04 Describe how business processes affect the firm’s value chain.
Topic: The Value Chain and Accounting Information Systems

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
10. Relevant information is that information that is free from bias and error.
Answer: FALSE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-01 Define an accounting information system and explain characteristics of useful information.
Topic: Definition of Accounting Information Systems, Attributes of Useful Information

11. The characteristics of relevant information include predictive value, feedback value and timeliness.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-01 Define an accounting information system and explain characteristics of useful information.
Topic: Definition of Accounting Information Systems, Attributes of Useful Information

12. The characteristics of reliable information are that the information is verifiable, without bias
and timely.
Answer: FALSE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-01 Define an accounting information system and explain characteristics of useful information.
Topic: Definition of Accounting Information Systems, Attributes of Useful Information

13. Information overload is defined as the difficulty a person faces in understanding a problem and making
a decision as a consequence of too much information.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-02 Distinguish between data, information and an information system.
Topic: Definition of Accounting Information Systems, Attributes of Useful Information

14. The main financial benefit of Customer Relationship Management practices reduces the cost of
goods sold.
Answer: FALSE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
15. An efficient Enterprise System can significantly lower the cost of support processes included in sales,
general, and administrative expenses.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

16. An accounting information system (AIS) is defined as being an information system that records,
processes and reports on transactions to provide financial and nonfinancial information for
decision making and control.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-01 Define an accounting information system and explain characteristics of useful information.
Topic: Definition of Accounting Information Systems

17. An enterprise system is a centralized database that collects data from throughout the firm. This
includes data from orders, customers, sales, inventory and employees.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-06 Describe how AIS assists the firm’s internal business processes.
Topic: AIS and Internal Business Processes

18. Outbound logistics are the activities associated with receiving and storing raw materials and other
partially completed materials, and distributing those materials to manufacturing when and where they
are needed.
Answer: FALSE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-04 Describe how business processes affect the firm’s value chain.
Topic: The Value Chain and Accounting Information Systems
19. Service Activities as defined in the value chain are those activities that provide the support of customers
after the products and services are sold to them (e.g. warranty repairs, parts, instruction manuals, etc.).
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-04 Describe how business processes affect the firm’s value chain.

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Topic: The Value Chain and Accounting Information Systems

20. A well-designed and well-functioning AIS can be expected to create value by providing relevant
information helpful to management to increase revenues and reduce expenses.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

21. Production of a 1040 tax form from the AIS to be delivered to the Internal Revenue Service is an
example of discretionary information.
Answer: FALSE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-02 Distinguish between data, information and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information

22. An enterprise system is primarily used to manage and nurture a firm’s interactions with its current and
potential clients.
Answer: FALSE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-06 Describe how AIS assists the firm’s internal business processes.
Topic: AIS and Internal Business Processes

23. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 is a federal law in the United States that set new and enhanced
standards for all U.S. public companies, their management and public accounting firms.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-03 Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems
Topic: Role of Accountants in Accounting Information Systems

24. CRM software often includes the use of database marketing tools to learn more about the customers
and to develop strong firm-to-customer relationships.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-07 Assess how AIS facilitates the firm’s external business processes.
Topic: AIS and External Business Processes

25. The Certified Information Technology Professional is the position created by the AICPA to recognize
CPAs who have the ability to provide skilled professional services on Information Technology.
Answer: TRUE
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-03 Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems.
Topic: Data versus Information

Multiple Choice Questions


26. Accounting information systems:
a. Are always computerized.
b. Report only accounting information.
c. Include records, processes and reports.
d. Are for computer games.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-01 Define an accounting information system and explain characteristics of useful information.
Topic: Definition of Accounting Information Systems
27. Which of the following isnot a characteristic of useful information?
a. Easy to understand
b. Feedback value
c. Timeliness
d. Representational Faithfulness
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-01 Define an accounting information system and explain characteristics of useful information.
Topic: Attributes of Useful Information

28. Which of the following are considered to be mandatory information required by a regulatory body?
a. Financial reports for the Securities and Exchange Commission
b. The amount of taxes saved by a merger
c. The total dollar value of fireworks that are sold on July 4
d. The cost to build an all-new Starbucks restaurant in Abu Dhabi
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02 Distinguish between data, information and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
29. The correct order of effects in the value chain are:
a. Inbound Logistics Operations Service

b. Inbound Logistics Outbound Logistics Marketing & Sales

c. Inbound Logistics Operations Outbound Logistics


d. Inbound Logistics Operations Service
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-04 Describe how business processes affect the firm’s value chain.
Topic: The Value Chain and Accounting Information Systems

30. Which designation would be most appropriate for those professionals possessing IT audit, control
and security skills?
a. Certified Internal Auditor (CIA)
b. Certified Public Accountant (CPA)
c. Certified Information Technology Professional (CITP)
d. Certified Information Systems Auditors (CISA)
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems.
Topic: Role of Accountants in Accounting Information Systems

31. Which designation is for CPAs with a broad range of technology knowledge and experience?
a. Certified Internal Auditor (CIA)
b. Certified Public Accountant (CPA)
c. Certified Information Technology Professional (CITP)
d. Certified Information Systems Auditors (CISA)
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems.
Topic: Role of Accountants in Accounting Information Systems

32. A supply chain:


a. Refers to the supplies needed to build products.
b. Refers to the flow of materials, information, payments and services.
c. Is similar in function and purpose to the value chain.
d. Does not apply to a service firm like an accounting firm.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-07 Assess how AIS facilitates the firm’s external business processes.
Topic: AIS and External Business Processes

33. A supply chain system does not include information about:

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
a. Current customers.
b. Prospective customers.
c. Availability of inventory.
d. Current suppliers.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-07 Assess how AIS facilitates the firm’s external business processes.
Topic: AIS and External Business Processes

34. The income statement line item most likely affected by an AIS investment in enterprise
systems would be:
a. Revenues.
b. Cost of Goods Sold.
c. Selling, General and Administrative Expenses.
d. Unearned Revenue.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

35. The income statement line item most likely affected by an AIS investment in supply chain that
would interface with suppliers would be:
a. Revenues.
b. Cost of Goods Sold.
c. Selling, General and Administrative Expenses.
d. Research and Development Expenses.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices
36. The IT strategic roles of AIS investments are classified as:
a. Automate, Informate, Transform.
b. Value creation, Value Destruction, Value Neutral.
c. Digitize, Report, Transform.
d. Automate, Digitize, Transport.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

37. According to a recent study, the transform IT strategic role is defined as systems that:
a. Replacehuman labor in automating business processes.
b. Provide information about business activities to all employees.
c. Provide information about business activities to senior management.
d. Fundamentally redefine business processes and relationships.

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

38. According to a recent study, the informate-up IT strategic role is defined as systems that:
a. Replacehuman labor in automating business processes.
b. Provideinformation about business activities to all employees.
c. Provide information about business activities to senior management.
d. Fundamentally redefine business processes and relationships.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

39. The income statement account most likely affected by an AIS investment in customer
relationship management (CRM) would be:
a. Revenues.
b. Cost of Goods Sold.
c. Selling, General and Administrative Expenses.
d. Unearned Revenue.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

40. Many hospitals and doctor’s offices are beginning to digitize the medical records of their patients. This
is an example of the strategic role.
a. Automate
b. Informate – up
c. Transform
d. Informate – down
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

41. EBay uses information technology to sell goods on the internet. This would be an example of the
strategic role.
a. Automate
b. Informate – up
c. Transform
d. Informate – down

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

42. The Information Value Chain is defined as:


a. The flow of materials, information, payments, and services.
b. The use of computer technology to provide information about business activities to
employees across the firm.
c. The overall transformation of data from a business need to the ultimate decision.
d. A centralized database that collects data from throughout the firm.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02 Distinguish between data, information and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information

43. Business Value is defined as:


a. The monetary value of a business.
b. Items, events and interactions that determine the financial health and well-being of the firm.
c. The cost to acquire a business by an outsider.
d. The overall value of taking data and transforming it in to information needed for decision making.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-04 Describe how business processes affect the firm’s value chain.
Topic: The Value Chain and Accounting Information Systems

44. Customer Relationship Management is defined as:


a. A system used to manage and nurture a firm’s i nterac ti ons wi th i ts c urr ent and
potential customers.
b. A system used to track a customer’s past purchases
c. A system used to connect a firm’s suppliers with a firm’s customers.
d. A system used to advertise current items on sale to customers.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-07 Assess how AIS facilitates the firm’s external business processes.
Topic: AIS and External Business Processes

45. Support activities in the value chain do not include:


a. Firm Infrastructure.
b. Human Resource Management.
c. Procurement.
d. Accounting and Finance.

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-04 Describe how business processes affect the firm’s value chain.
Topic: The Value Chain and Accounting Information Systems
46. The role of accountants in accounting information systems include all except:
a. User.
b. Manager.
c. Operator.
d. Evaluator.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems.
Topic: Role of Accountants in Accounting Information Systems
47. A simple information system includes all but the following elements except:
a. Processing.
b. Storage.
c. Input.
d. Reporting.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02 Distinguish between data, information and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information
48. Activity-based costing is an example of:
a. Information overload.
b. Mandatory information.
c. Discretionary information.
d. Enterprise System.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02 Distinguish between data, information and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information

49. An example of an AIS that primarily addresses internal business processes includes:
a. Supply chain software.
b. Customer relationship management software.
c. B2B transaction software.
d. Enterprise systems.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-06 Describe how AIS assists the firm’s internal business processes.

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Topic: AIS and Internal
Business Processes

50. Bob’s manager complains that Bob suffers from “Analysis Paralysis;” that is, he spends too much time
reviewing endless reports and is reluctant to make decisions. Bob most likely suffers from _.
e. Data gridlock.
f. Discretionary information.
g. Information overload.
h. Data redundancy.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02Distinguish among data, information, and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information

51. Which of the following systems would a company be most likely to employ for the primary purpose
of generating additional sales revenue?
a. MDBMS.
b. CRM.
c. SCM.
d. OCR.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-07Assess how AIS facilitates the firm’s external business processes.
Topic: AIS and External Business Processes

52. The primary transformation of data into information takes place in which of the following activities?
a. Input.
b. Storage.
c. Processing.
d. Output.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02Distinguish among data, information, and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information

53. Discretionary information is most likely to be used in which of the following activities?
a. Preparing required Environmental Protection Agency emissions reports.
b. Filing a 10-K with the SEC.
c. Management decision-making.
d. Payroll tax reporting.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02Distinguish among data, information, and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information
54. Which of the following is not a primary activity in the Value Chain?
a. Outbound Logistics.
b. Marketing.
c. Inbound Logistics.
d. Information Technology.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-04Describe how business processes affect the firm’s value chain.
Topic: The Value Chain and Accounting Information Systems

55. One of the most important ways that ERPs benefit organizations and their business processes is:
a. Current information is made available to all users involved in the activities and
decisions associated with a company’s business processes.
b. Information is stored in many specialized, distributed databases that each serve separate
business processes.
c. Reducing the amount of time to complete business processes by eliminating all controls
associated with the processes.
d. Preventing external business partners from accessing the organization’s data.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-06Describe how AIS assists the firm’s internal business processes.
Topic: AIS and Internal Business Processes

56. One common way of measuring the effectiveness of the Supply Chain is through the fill rate. Which
of the following best describes the fill rate?
a. The percentage, in monetary value, of a supplier’s order w hic h i s ac tual ly deli ver ed t o
the organization.
b. The number of items per hour that receiving employees can move from the receiving dock to
the warehouse.
c. The rate at which the stock in warehouse storage bins increases.
d. The average amount of time it takes for the organization to fulfill customers’ orders.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-07Assess how AIS facilitates the firm’s external business processes.
Topic: AIS and External Business Processes

57. Investors reward companies most that announce IT initiatives with which type of strategic role?
a. Automate.
b. Informate – up.
c. Transform.
d. Informate – down.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02Distinguish among data, information, and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information

58. A dental practice implemented an upgrade to its AIS that provides the dentists with daily and
weekly patient and financial summaries. The practice’s upgrade is an example of which IT strategic role?
a. Automate.
b. Informate – up.
c. Transform
d. Informate – down.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-08Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

59. Which of the following most accurately describes IFAC’s description of accounting and IT?
a. IT is an important peripheral discipline to accounting.
b. Accounting and IT are indistinguishable from one another.
c. It is difficult to conceive of accounting independent from IT.
d. Accounting is an important peripheral discipline to IT.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information, and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems.
Topic: Role of Accountants in Accounting Information Systems

60. Which of the following diagrams most accurately illustrates an information

system? Feedback

Design Prototype User


a.

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Test

Design Build Implement


b.

Storage

Input Process Output


c. Correct.

Ledger

Economic Financial
Journal
Event Report
d.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-01Define an accounting information system, and explain characteristics of useful
information.
Topic: Definition of Accounting Information Systems

61. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 requires that a company’s attest auditors be able to perform which
of the following activities?
a. Evaluate the internal controls in an AIS.
b. Assess the value of a company’s IT assets.
c. Take over the company’s AIS if necessary.
d. Design and implement the controls used in the AIS.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Learning Objective: 01-03Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information, and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems.
Topic: Role of Accountants in Accounting Information Systems

62. Consider the non-profit organization Doctors without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières), a Nobel
Peace Prize winning organization that provides medical services in war zones and developing countries.
For this type of organization, which of the following would likely be the best measure of business value?
a. Fund balance (i.e., the net of revenues less expenditures).
b. Lives saved.
c. Donations raised.
d. Volunteers deployed.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-04: Describe how business processes affect the firm’s value chain.
Topic: The Value Chain and Accounting Information Systems

63. Effective use of Supply Chain Management software is generally expected to provide all of
the following benefits except:
a. Reduced inventory carrying costs.
b. Lower production costs.
c. Reduced gross margins.
d. Better communications with suppliers.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-07: Assess how AIS facilitates the firm’s external business processes.
Topic: AIS and External Business Processes

64. Which of the following is usually the primary objective for companies when creating
mandatory information?
a. The value of the information exceeds the cost to produce it.
b. Minimize cost.
c. Improve business decisions.
d. Ensure proper controls over business processes.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Apply
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02: Distinguish among data, information, and an information system.
Topic: Data versus Information

Essay Questions

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
65. After a college football game, a box score is produced detailing the number of yards passing
and running, receptions made and the number of interceptions and fumbles lost (among other
statistics). Using the characteristics of useful information (including relevance and reliability),
please explain how this box score meets (or does not meet) the characteristics of useful
information. How would the football coach use this information to prepare for the next game,
decide which players to start, etc.?

Answers will vary, especially with respect to their knowledge of American Football! The instructor may
wish to include other sports or other activities where a box score might be produced. In American
Football, yards per carry, turnover margin, interceptions, fumbles, run vs. pass plays, 3rd down plays and
success, yards per catch, yards after catch, number of tackles, etc. would all be useful.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-01 Define an accounting information system and explain characteristics of useful information.
Topic: Definition of Accounting Information Systems,Attributes of Useful Information

66. List and explain three ways that AIS affects the income statement and the firm’s profitability.

Answers will varybut could include some of these items.

Income Statement Effect of AIS on Income Statement


Revenues Customer Relationship Management techniques
could attract new customers, generating
additional sales revenue.

Less: Cost of Goods Sold Supply Chain Management Software allows firms
to carry the right inventory and have it in the right
place at the right time. This, in turn, will lower
obsolescence as well as logistics and procurement
costs.
Gross Margin
Less: Selling, General and Administrative An efficient Enterprise System can significantly
Expenses (SG&A) lower the cost of support processes included in
sales, general, and administrative expenses.

Less: Interest Expense Supply Chain Management Software allows the


firm to carry less inventory. The less inventory the
firm has to carry leaves less assets to finance, and
may possibly reduce debt and its related interest.

Net Income All combined, a well-designed and well-functioning


AIS with investments in Enterprise Systems,
Supply Chain Management and/or Customer
Relationship Management can be expected to
improve net income

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

67. Some would argue that the role of accounting is simply as an information provider. Others suggest
that accountants serve the role of business analyst. Which role produces more value for a company like
Starbucks? In the area of accounting information systems, what specifically can the accountant do to serve
as a business analyst to help address business opportunities?

Answers will vary! Accountants carry out an important function by providing information. However, it is
arguable that accountants can add value to a company by serving as a business analyst; that is,
understand what information needs to be collected and then help in its interpretation.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-03 Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems
Topic: Role of Accountants in Accounting Information Systems

68. Explain the types of discretionary information a company like Google would collect from its
accounting information system.

Answers will vary! Google might want some managerial accounting information about how various
products and lines of business have done, the cost of production for various advertising products, the
cost of employee incentives (stock options, etc.) that would all be useful in helping it manage its
business.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-06 Describe how AIS assists the firm’s internal business processes.
Topic: AIS and Internal Business Processes

69. Why would the transform IT strategic role be more impactful on stock price than the automate
IT strategic role?

Answers will vary! A potential answer might include that automate IT strategic role just
automates something that was done before by hand. This generally represents a cost reduction
rather than a new revenue opportunity. The transform IT strategic involves using technology to
establish a new business model. New business models, while fraught with risk, often suggest new
ways to make money that were not envisioned before and thus might encourage shareholders to
pay more for a company’s stock.
AACSB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-08 Assess the impact of AIS on firm profitability and stock prices.
Topic: AIS, Firm Profitability, and Stock Prices

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
70. Stephen Gillett, Starbucks CIO, argues that his most crucial duty is to enhance Starbucks’ ability to
mine its customer data to help “reignite our passion with our customers.” Starbucks used loyalty cards
(Starbucks’ Reward cards) and surveys to track its customers’ purchases and build profiles of their
customers as mentioned in the opening chapter vignette. Why is this a good example of customer
relationship management (CRM)?

Answers will vary. Using loyalty cards will help Starbucks understand its customers; that is, what they
buy, when they buy it, where they buy it, in what quantities, etc., which is exactly the role of CRM.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-07 Assess how AIS facilitates the firm’s external business processes.
Topic: AIS and External Business Processes

71. Michael Dell of Dell Computer explained:


“We tell our suppliers exactly what our daily production requirements are so it is not, "Well, every two
weeks deliver 5,000 to this warehouse, and we'll put them on the shelf, and then we'll take them off
the shelf." It is, "Tomorrow morning we need 8,562, and deliver them to door number seven by 7 am."

How does the supply chain management software allow this to happen? And how does it save Dell
money?

Answers will vary. The supply chain allows Dell to forecast demand for its various products and share
that demand with its suppliers. Suppliers will know the long-term plan and thus not be surprised when
an actual order arrives. Dell saves money by not having to hold inventory too long saving investment
dollars and warehouse space.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-07 Assess how AIS facilitates the firm’s external business processes.
Topic: AIS and External Business Processes

72. Amazon.com is one of the best at fostering its interaction with their customers by keeping a record of
their past purchases and product searches and using that information to recommend other similar products for
the customer to consider. How can they use that information to help them in their marketing efforts?

Answers will vary. By getting this information, Amazon understand its customers; that is, what they
buy, when they buy it, in what quantities, etc., and can use it to encourage its customers to buy
more products that computer models suggest they might be interested in.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-07 Assess how AIS facilitates the firm’s external business processes.
Topic: AIS and External Business Processes

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
73. The Certified Information Systems Auditors (CISA) designation identifies those professionals
possessing IT audit, control and security skills. How do you think a professional designation is helpful for IT
auditors?

Answers will vary. The answer should emphasize the need for specialized skills in order to fully understand
and audit an AIS and the technology surrounding it. The CISA designation recognizes that the IS auditor has
demonstrated those skills through demonstration of knowledge and practical experience.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-03 Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems
Topic: Role of Accountants in Accounting Information Systems

74. The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) and International Federation of
Accountants (IFAC) assumes that, at a minimum, all accountants will be proficient in the AIS user role and
at least one other role listed above (manager or designer or evaluator). Why would the AICPA and IFAC
expect this proficiency?

Answers will vary. A potential answer might indicate that all accountants are users in some sense; at a
minimum, they will request and use information in the AIS to perform their jobs, no matter which role
they play. The additional role they play will depend on the function being performed, whether as an
employee of a company, an auditor for a CPA firm, a tax advisor, an AIS consultant, or other some
other function.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-03 Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems
Topic: Role of Accountants in Accounting Information Systems

75. The International Federation of Accountants says:


“IT has grown (and will continue to grow) in importance at such a rapid pace and with such far reaching
effects that it can no longer be considered a discipline peripheral to accounting. Rather, professional
accounting has merged and developed with IT to such an extent that one can hardly conceive of
accounting independent from IT.”
In your opinion, why is accounting now interdependent with IT?

Answers will vary. A potential answer might reflect information presented in the class or textbook
about the IT nature of accounting and the importance of accountants being proficient in roles
associated with IT.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Learning Objective: 01-03 Distinguish the roles of accountants in providing information and explain certifications related to accounting information
systems
Topic: Role of Accountants in Accounting Information Systems

76. Wal-Mart’s Retail Link database is one of the world’s largest databases and allows many of their
suppliers to view real-time sales data of their products for each store. This allows suppliers to assess the
demand for their products and to optimize their own level of inventory and related logistics costs. How is
this cost savings ultimately passed on to Wal-Mart and its customers?

Answers will vary. A potential answer might reflect that Retail Link saves Wal-Mart and its
supplier’smoney due to its assessment of what sells and what does not sell. This helps suppliers to save
money and Wal-Mart thus requires that this savings be shared between suppliers, Wal-Mart, and Wal-
Mart suppliers.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-07 Assess how AIS facilitates the firm’s external business processes.
Topic: AIS and External Business Processes

77. Business value is defined as all items, events and interactions that determine the financial health
and well-being of the firm. This value may come from suppliers, customers or employees or even
information systems.
How would a not-for-profit group like the International Red Cross define business value for its group?

Answers will vary. A not-for-profit group like the International Red Cross might define value by the
number of lives saved, the number of liters of blood in storage, its ability to react to a disasters, etc.

AACSB: Reflective Thinking


AICPA BB: Industry
AICPA FN: Decision Making
Blooms: Analyze
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-04 Describe how business processes affect the firm’s value chain.
Topic: The Value Chain and Accounting Information Systems

© 2018 by McGraw-Hill Education. This is proprietary material solely for authorized instructor use. Not authorized for sale or distribution in any manner.
This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.
Another random document with
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evidence to have been originally executed as an ornament for this
cathedral by English workmen at the command of Bishop Odo, half-
brother of the Conqueror. There is no basis for the common belief that
it was the work of Queen Matilda or her ladies, but efforts to place it
one or even two centuries later have proved unavailing against the
evidence of armor and costume, and the general opinion of scholars
now regards it as belonging to the eleventh century and thus
substantially contemporary with the events which it depicts.
The modern literature of the battle is also commensurate with its
importance. The classic account is found in the third volume of
Freeman’s majestic History of the Norman Conquest, where the story
is told with a rare combination of minute detail and spirited narrative
which reminds us, it has been said, of a battle of the Iliad or a Norse
saga. Splendid as this narrative is, its enthusiasm often carries it
beyond the evidence of the sources, and in several fundamental points
it can no longer be accepted as historically sound. The theory of the
palisade upon which Freeman’s conception of the English tactics
rested has been destroyed by the trenchant criticism of that profound
student of Anglo-Norman history, J. Horace Round, and his whole
treatment has been vigorously attacked from the point of view of the
scientific study of military history by Wilhelm Spatz and his
distinguished master, Hans Delbrück, of Berlin. Unfortunately the
Berlin critics are influenced too much by certain theories of military
organization; they do not call the English soldier of the period a
degenerate, but they consider him, and the Norman knight as well,
incapable of the disciplined and united action required by all real
strategy, incapable even of forming the shield-wall and executing the
feigned flight described by the contemporary chroniclers of the battle.
While it is true that mediæval fighting was far more individualistic than
that of ancient or modern armies and lacked also the flexible
conditions which lie at the basis of modern tactics, there is the best of
contemporary evidence for a certain amount of strategical movement
at Hastings. On one point, however, the modern military critics have
compelled us to modify our ideas of the battles of earlier times,
namely, with respect to the numbers engaged. Against the constant
tendency to magnify the size of the military forces, a tendency
accentuated in the Middle Ages by the complete recklessness of
chroniclers when dealing with large figures, modern criticism has
pointed out the limitations of battle-space, transportation, and
commissariat. The five millions with which Xerxes is said to have
invaded Greece are a physical impossibility, for Delbrück has shown
that, with this number moving under normal conditions, the rear-guard
could not have crossed the Tigris when the first Persians reached
Thermopylæ. Similarly the fifty or sixty thousand knights attributed to
William the Conqueror shrink to one-tenth the number when brought to
face with the official lists of English and Norman knights’ fees. If
William’s army did not exceed five or six thousand, that of Harold could
not have been much greater and may well have been less; though
William’s panegyrist places the number of English at 1,200,000, not
more than 12,000 could have stood, in the closest formation, on the hill
which they occupied at Hastings. Small skirmishes these, to those who
have followed the battles of the Marne, the Aisne, the Vistula, and the
San, yet none the less important in the world’s history!
In spite of all the controversy, the main lines of the battle seem
fairly clear. The troops of Harold occupied a well-defended hill eight
miles inland from Hastings on the London road, the professional guard
of housecarles in front, protected by the solid wall of their shields and
supported by the thegns and other fully armed troops, the levies of the
countryside behind or at the sides, armed with javelins, stone clubs,
and farmers’ weapons. They had few archers and no cavalry, but the
steep hill was well protected from the assaults of the Norman horse
and favored the firm defence which the English tactics dictated. The
Norman lines consisted first of archers, then of heavy-armed foot-
soldiers, and finally of the mailed horsemen, their centre grouped
about William and the standard which he had received from the Pope.
After a preliminary attack by the archers and foot, the knights came
forward, preceded by the minstrel Taillefer, “a jongleur whom a very
brave heart ennobled,” qui mult bien chantout, throwing his sword in
the air and catching it as he sang—

De Karlemaigne e de Of Roland and of


Rollant Charlemagne,
E d’Oliver e des vassals Oliver and the vassals all
Qui morurent en Who fell in fight at Roncevals.
Rencevals.
But the horses recoiled from the hill, pursued by many of the English,
and only the sight of William, his head bared of its helmet so as to be
seen by his men, rallied the knights again. The mass of the English
stood firm behind their shield-wall and their line could be broken only
by the ruse of a feigned flight, from which the Normans turned to
surround and cut to pieces their pursuers. Even then the housecarles
were unmoved, until the arrows of the high-shooting Norman bowmen
finally opened up the gaps in their ranks into which William’s horsemen
pressed against the battle-axes of the king’s guard. And then, as
darkness began to fall, Harold was mortally wounded by an arrow, the
guard was cut to pieces, and the remnant fled. “Here Harold was killed
and the English turned to flight” is the final heading in the Bayeux
Tapestry, while in the margin the spoilers strip the coats of mail from
the dead and drive off the horses of the slain knights.

* * * * *
“A single battle settled the fate of England.” There was still grim
work to be done—the humbling of Exeter, the harrying of
Northumberland, the subjection of the earls, but these were only local
episodes. There was no one but William who could effectively take
Harold’s place, and when on Christmas Day he had been crowned at
London, he could reduce opposition at his leisure. The chronicle of
these later years belongs to English rather than to Norman history.
The results of the Conquest, too, are of chief significance for the
conquered. For the Normans the immediate effect was a great
opportunity for expansion in every department of life. There was work
for the warrior in completing the subjugation of the land, for the
organizer and statesman in the new adjustments of central and local
government, for the prelate in bringing his new diocese into line with
the practice of the church on the Continent, for the monks to found
new priories and administer the new lands which their monasteries
now received beyond the Channel. The Norman townsman and the
Norman merchant followed hard upon the Norman armies, in the
Norman colony in London, in the traders of the ports, in the boroughs
of the western border. In part, of course, the change was simply the
replacing of one set of persons by another, putting a Norman
archbishop in place of Stigand at Canterbury, spreading over the map
the Montgomeries and Percies, the Mowbrays and the Mortimers and
scores of other household names of English history; but it was also a
work of readjustment and reorganization which required all the Norman
gift for constructive work. A certain élan passes through Norman life
and reflects itself in Norman literature, as the Normans become more
conscious of the glory of their achievements and the greatness of their
new empire. England had become an appendage to Normandy, and
men did not yet see that the relation would soon be reversed.
For England, the Norman Conquest determined permanently the
orientation of English politics and English culture. Geographically
belonging, with the Scandinavian countries, to the outlying lands of
Europe, the British Isles had been in serious danger of sharing their
remoteness from the general movements of European life and drifting
into the back waters of history. The union with Normandy turned
England southward and brought it at once into the full current of
European affairs—political entanglements, ecclesiastical connections,
cultural influences. England became a part of France and thus entered
fully into the life of the world to which France belonged. It received the
speech of France, the literature of France, and the art of France; its
law became in large measure Frankish, its institutions more completely
feudal. Yet the connection with France ran through Normandy, and the
French influence took on Norman forms. Most of all was this true in the
field in which the Norman excelled, that of government: English
feudalism was Norman feudalism, in which the barons were weak and
the central power strong, and it was the heavy hand of Norman
kingship that turned the loose and disintegrating Anglo-Saxon state
into the English nation. England was Europeanized only at the price of
being Normanized.
From the point of view both of immediate achievement and of
ultimate results, the conquest of England was the crowning act of
Norman history. Something doubtless was due to good fortune,—to the
absence of an English fleet, to the favorable opportunity in French
politics, to the mistakes of the English. But the fundamental facts,
without which these would have meant nothing, were the strength and
discipline of Normandy and the personality of her leader. Diplomat,
warrior, leader of men, William was preëminently a statesman, and it
was his organizing genius which “turned the defeat of English arms
into the making of the English nation.” This talent for political
organization was, however, no isolated endowment of the Norman
duke, but was shared in large measure by the Norman barons, as is
abundantly shown by the history of Norman rule in Italy and Sicily. For
William and for his followers the conquest of England only gave a
wider field for qualities of state-building which had already shown
themselves in Normandy.

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

A detailed narrative of the relations between Normandy and


England in the eleventh century is given by E. A. Freeman in his
History of the Norman Conquest (Oxford, 1870–79), but large
portions of this work need to be rewritten in the light of later
studies, especially those of Round. There is a brief biography of
William the Conqueror by Freeman in the series of “Twelve
English Statesmen” (London, 1888), and a fuller one by F. M.
Stenton in the “Heroes of the Nations” (1908). For the institutions
of Normandy see my articles on “Knight Service in Normandy in
the Eleventh Century,” in English Historical Review, xxii, pp. 636–
49; “The Norman ‘Consuetudines et Iusticie’ of William the
Conqueror,” ibid. xxiii, pp. 502–08; and “Normandy under William
the Conqueror,” in American Historical Review, xiv, pp. 453–76
(1909); also L. Valin, Le duc de Normandie et sa cour, 912–1204
(Paris, 1910). For church and state, see H. Böhmer, Kirche und
Staat in England und in der Normandie (Leipzig, 1899). The
dealings of the Norman dukes with their continental neighbors are
narrated by A. Fliche, Le règne de Philippe Ier roi de France (Paris,
1912); L. Halphen, Le comté d’Anjou au XIe siècle (Paris, 1906);
R. Latouche, Histoire du comté du Maine pendant le Xe et le XIe
siècle (Paris, 1910); F. Lot, Fidèles ou vassaux (Paris, 1904), ch. 6
(on the feudal relations of the Norman dukes and the French
kings). There is a good sketch of France in the eleventh century by
Luchaire in the Histoire de France of Lavisse, ii, part 2; a fuller
work on this period is expected from Maurice Prou. For the
literature of the battle of Hastings, see Gross, Sources and
Literature, nos. 707a, 2812, 2998–3000; the most important works
are those of Round, Spatz, and Delbrück, Geschichte der
Kriegskunst, iii, pp. 147–62 (1907). The Bayeux Tapestry is most
conveniently accessible in the small edition of F. R. Fowke
(reprinted, London, 1913); see also Gross, no. 2139, and Ph.
Lauer, in Mélanges Charles Bémont (Paris, 1913), pp. 43–58.
Freeman discusses the results of the Conquest in his fifth volume;
see also Gaston Paris, L’esprit normand en Angleterre, in La
poésie du moyen âge, second series (Paris, 1895), pp. 45–74.
IV
THE NORMAN EMPIRE

THE lecture upon Normandy and England sought to place in their


Norman perspective the events leading to the Norman Conquest and
to show how that decisive triumph of Norman strength and daring was
made possible by the development of an exceptional ducal authority in
Normandy and Maine and by the personal greatness of William the
Conqueror. We now come to follow still further this process of
expansion, to the Scotch border, to Ireland, to the Pyrenees, until the
empire of the Plantagenet kings became the chief political fact in
western Europe. The Norman empire is the outstanding feature of the
twelfth century, as the conquest of England was of the eleventh.

* * * * *
This great imperial state is commonly known, not as the Norman,
but as the Angevin, empire, because its rulers, Henry II, Richard, and
John, were descended in the male line from the counts of Anjou. The
phrase is, however, a misnomer, since it leads one to suppose that the
Angevin counts were its creators, which is in no sense the case. The
centre of the empire was Normandy, its founders were the Norman
dukes. The marriage of the Princess Matilda to Count Geoffrey
Plantagenet added Anjou to Normandy rather than Normandy to Anjou,
and it was as duke of Normandy that their son Henry II began his
political career. The extension of his domains southward by marriage
only gave Normandy the central position in his realm, and it was the
loss of Normandy under John which led to the empire’s collapse.
Against the application of the term ‘empire’ to the dominion of
Henry II more cogent reasons may be urged. It rests, so far as I know,
upon no contemporary authority, and even if the phrase could be found
by some chance in a writer of the twelfth century, it would carry with it
no weight. Western Europe in the Middle Ages knew but one empire,
the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation—from one point of view
neither holy nor Roman nor an empire, as Voltaire long afterward
remarked, yet, as revived by Charlemagne and Otto the Great,
representing to the mind of the Middle Ages the idea of universal
monarchy which they had inherited from ancient Rome. To the men of
the twelfth century the emperor was Frederick Barbarossa; he could
not be Henry II. Nor will the government of the Norman-Angevin ruler
square with the modern definition of an empire as “a state formed by
27
the rule of one state over other states.” His various dominions, if we
except Ireland, were not dependencies of England, or Anjou, or
Normandy. King in England, duke in Normandy, count in Anjou and
Maine, duke again in Aquitaine, Henry ruled each of his dominions as
its feudal lord—very much as if the German Emperor to-day combined
in himself the titles of king of Prussia and of Bavaria, grand duke of
Baden, duke of Brunswick, prince of Waldeck, and so on throughout
the members of the German confederation. Such a government is not
an empire in the sense of the ancient Roman or the modern British
empires, for it has no dependencies. It is an empire only in the broader
and looser sense of the word, a great composite state, larger than a
mere kingdom and imperial in extent if not in organization.
That Henry’s realm was in extent imperial can easily be seen from
the map. It extended from Scotland to the frontier of Spain, as the
empire of his contemporary Frederick I extended from the Baltic and
the North Sea to central Italy. And if the kingdoms of Germany, Italy,
and Burgundy which made up Frederick’s empire covered in the
aggregate more territory, the actual authority of the ruler, whether in
army, justice, or finance, was decidedly less than in the Anglo-Norman
state. Henry had a stronger army, a larger revenue, a more centralized
government. Moreover, the Norman empire was less artificial than it
seems to us at first sight, accustomed as we are to the associations of
the modern map. There was, especially with mediæval methods of
communication, nothing anomalous in a state which straddled the
English Channel: Normandy was nearer England than was Ireland; it
was quite as easy to go from London to Rouen as from London to
York. The geographical bonds were also strong between Henry’s
continental dominions, for the roads of the twelfth century did not
radiate from Paris, but followed mainly the old Roman lines, and from
Rouen there was direct and easy connection with LeMans, Tours,
Poitiers, and Bordeaux. In the matter of race, too, we must beware of
being misled by our modern ideas. The English nation was at most
only the vaguest sort of a conception, the French nation did not exist
till the fifteenth century, and personal loyalty to the lord of many
different lands was a natural expression of the conditions of the age. It
is contrary to our prejudices that a single state should be formed out of
the hard-headed Norman, the Celtic fisherman of the Breton coast,—
the ‘Pêcheur d’Islande’ of a later day,—the Angevin, Tourangeau,
Poitevin, the troubadour of Aquitaine, and the Gascon of the far south,
with his alien blood and non-Aryan language, already a well-marked
type whose swaggering gasconades foreshadow the d’Artagnan of the
Three Musketeers and the ‘cadets de Gascogne’ of Cyrano de
Bergerac. But it was little harder to rule these diverse lands from
London or Rouen than from Paris; it was for the time being as easy to
make them part of a Norman empire as of a French kingdom. Over the
various languages and dialects ran the Latin of law and government
and the French of the court and of affairs; while in political matters
these countries were, as we shall see, quite capable of united action.
Let us call to mind how the empire of Henry II was formed. At the
death of the Conqueror in 1087 the lands which he had brought
together and ruled with such good peace were divided between his two
eldest sons, Robert receiving Normandy and William the Red,
England. Save for William’s regency over Normandy during his
brother’s absence on the Crusade, the two countries remained
separate during his reign, and were united once more only in 1106
when William’s successor, his younger brother Henry I, after defeating
and deposing Robert at Tinchebrai, ruled as duke of Normandy and
king of England. This was the inheritance which, after the death of
Prince William in the White Ship, Henry sought to hand down to his
daughter Matilda, but which passed for the most part to his nephew
Stephen of Blois. Stephen, however, never gained a firm hold in
England and soon lost Normandy to Matilda’s husband, Count
Geoffrey of Anjou, by whom it was conquered and ruled in the name of
his son Henry, later Henry II. Crowned duke of Normandy in 1150,
Henry succeeded his father as count of Anjou in the following year,
and at Stephen’s death in 1154 became king of England. Meanwhile, in
1152, he had contracted a marriage of the greatest political importance
with Eleanor, duchess of Aquitaine, whose union with the French king
Louis VII had just been annulled by the Pope; an alliance which made
him master of Poitou, Aquitaine, and Gascony and therewith of two-
thirds of France. Apart from certain adjustments in central France, the
only addition to these territories made during Henry’s reign was the
conquest of eastern Ireland in the years following 1169. Into these Irish
campaigns and their consequences for the whole later history of the
island we cannot attempt to go. Let me only point out that the leading
spirits were Norman, except so far as they were Irish exiles, and that
the names which now make their appearance in Irish annals are
Norman names—the Lacys and the Clares, the Fitzgeralds and the de
Courcys, as Irish before long as the Irish themselves.
Substantially, then, the empire of Henry II remained in extent as he
found it at his accession to the English throne at the age of twenty-one;
it was not created by him but inherited or annexed by marriage.
Accordingly it is not as a conqueror but as a ruler that he can lay claim
to greatness. But although Henry attempted little in the way of
acquiring new territory, he did much to consolidate his possessions
and to extend his European power and influence. His daughters were
married to the greatest princes of their time, Henry the Lion, duke of
Saxony and Bavaria, King Alphonso VIII of Castile, King William II of
Sicily. He made an alliance with the ruler of Provence and planned a
marriage with the house of Savoy that would have given him control of
the passes into Italy. He took his part in the struggle of Pope and anti-
Pope, of Pope and Emperor; he corresponded with the emperor of
Constantinople, refused the crown of the kingdom of Jerusalem, and
died on the eve of his departure on a crusade. No one could lay claim
to greater influence upon the international affairs of his time.
Occupying this international position, Henry must not be viewed,
as he generally is, merely as an English king. He was born and
educated on the Continent, began to reign on the Continent, and spent
a large part of his life in his continental dominions. He ruled more
territory outside of England than in, and his continental lands had at
least as large a place as England in his policy. It is perhaps too much
to say, in modern phrase, that he ‘thought imperially,’ but he certainly
did not think nationally; and when his latest biographer speaks of
28
Henry’s continental campaigns as “foreign affairs,” he is thinking
insularly, for Normandy, Anjou, Gascony even, were no more foreign
than England itself. Henry is not a national figure, either English or
French; he is international, if not cosmopolitan. Only from the point of
view of later times can we associate him peculiarly with English history,
when after the collapse of the Norman empire under his sons, the
permanent influence of his work continued to be felt most fully in
England.
Both as a man and as a ruler, the figure of Henry II has come down
to us distorted by the loves and hates of an age of the most violent and
bitter controversy. Brilliant though scarcely heroic to his friends, to his
enemies he was a veritable demon of tyranny and crime, whose lurid
end pointed many a moral respecting the sins of princes and the
vengeance of the Most High. Eminently a strong man, he was not
regarded as in any sense superhuman, but rather as an intensely
human figure, tempted in all points like as other men and yielding
where they yielded. Heavy, bull-necked, sensual, with a square jaw,
freckled face, reddish hair, and fiery eyes that blazed in sudden
paroxysms of anger, he must, in Bishop Stubbs’s phrase, “have looked
29
generally like a rough, passionate, uneasy man.” The dominant
impression is one of exhaustless energy accompanied by a physical
restlessness which kept him whispering and scribbling during mass,
hunting and hawking from morning to night, and riding constantly from
place to place throughout his vast dominions with a rapidity that always
took his enemies by surprise. On one occasion he covered one
hundred and seventy miles in two days. Well-educated for a prince of
his time and able to hold his own in ready converse with the clerks of
his court, his tastes were neither speculative nor romantic, but were
early turned toward practical life. He was primarily “an able, plausible,
30
astute, cautious, unprincipled man of business,” fond of work and
delighting in detail, with a distinct gift for organization and a mastery of
diplomacy, wise in the selection of his subordinates, skilful in evasion,
but quick and sure in action. Strong, clear-headed, and tenacious,
Henry represents the type of the man of large affairs, and in another
age might have amassed a large private fortune as a successful
business man. In the twelfth century the chief opportunity for talent of
this sort was in public life, where the king’s household was also the
government of the state, the strengthening of royal authority was the
surest means of attaining national unity and security, and the interest
of the king coincided with the interest of the state. To the present day,
with its cry for business men in public office, this seems natural
enough; but we must remember that feudalism meant exactly the
opposite of business efficiency, and that the problem of creating an
effective government in the midst of a feudal society turned largely on
the maintenance of a businesslike administration of justice, finance,
and the army. By his success in these fields Henry went a long way
toward creating a modern state, and did, as a matter of fact, establish
the most highly organized and effective government of its time in
western Europe.
Our conceptions of the nature of Henry II’s public work have been
in certain respects modified as the result of modern research. It has
become clear, in the first place, that he was an administrator rather
than a legislator, and that such of his legislation as has reached us
belongs in the category of instructions to his officers rather than in that
of general enactments. These measures lack the permanence of
statutes; they are supplemented, modified, withdrawn, in accordance
with the will of a sovereign whose restless temper showed itself in a
constant series of legal and administrative experiments. Many of his
changes seem to have been effected through oral command rather
than written instructions. In the second place, Henry’s originality has
been somewhat diminished by a more careful study of the work of his
predecessors, notably of Henry I, in whose reign it is now possible to
trace at work some of the elements that were once supposed to have
been innovations of his grandson. As a whole, however, the work of
Henry II stands the test of analysis and gives him an eminent place in
the number of mediæval statesmen.

* * * * *
Precocious in many ways as was the political organization of
Henry’s dominions, it was conditioned by the circumstances of its time,
and we must be careful to conceive it in terms of the twelfth century
and not of the fifteenth or the twentieth. The Norman sovereign had at
his disposal none of the legal or bureaucratic traditions which were still
maintained at Constantinople and were not without their influence
upon the Norman kingdom of Sicily. Nor was the time ripe for the
creation out of hand of a strong central government for his various
territories, such as became possible in the Burgundian state of the
fifteenth century and in the Austrian state which was modelled upon it.
Henry was in the midst of a feudal society and had to make the best of
it. He had to reckon with the particularistic traditions of his several
dominions as well as with the feudal opposition to strong government,
and western Europe was still a long way from the economic conditions
which lie at the basis of modern bureaucracies.
When we speak of the Anglo-Norman or the Angevin empire, we
must accordingly dismiss from our minds at the outset any notion of a
government with a capital, a central treasury and judicature, and a
common assembly. A fixed central treasury existed only in the most
advanced of the individual states, and it was many years before the
courts established themselves permanently at Westminster and
Rouen. Government was still something personal, centring in the
person of the sovereign, and the ministers of the state were still his
household servants. The king had no fixed residence, and as he
moved from place to place, his household and its officers moved with
him. Indeed kings were just beginning to learn that it was safer to leave
their treasure in some strong castle than to carry it about in their
wanderings; it was not till 1194 that the capture of his baggage train by
Richard the Lion-Hearted taught the French king Philip Augustus to
leave his money and his title-deeds at Paris when he went on a military
expedition. We must not be surprised to find that the principal common
element in Henry’s empire was Henry himself, supplemented by his
most immediate household officers, and that many of these officers,
such as the seneschals and the justiciars, were limited in their
functions to England or Normandy or Anjou, and usually remained in
their particular country to look after affairs in the king’s absence. There
was, however, one notable exception, the chancellor, or royal
secretary. Regularly an ecclesiastic, so that there was no chance of his
turning the office into an hereditary fief, the nature of the chancellor’s
duties attached him continuously to the person of the sovereign and
made him the natural companion of the royal journeys. He was far,
however, from being a mere private secretary or amanuensis, but
stood at the head of a regular secretarial bureau, which had its clerks
and chaplains and its well-organized system of looking after the king’s
business. The study of the history of institutions goes to show that, on
the whole, there is no better test of the strength or weakness of a
mediæval government than its chancery. If it had no chancery, as was
the case under the early Norman dukes, or if its methods, as seen in
its formal acts, were irregular and unbusinesslike, as under Robert
Curthose, there was sure to be a lack of organization and continuity in
its general conduct of affairs. If, on the other hand, the chancery was
well organized, its rules and practices regularly observed, its
documents clear and sharp and to the point, this meant normally that
an efficient government stood behind it.
Now, judged by the most exacting standards, the chancery of
Henry II had reached a high degree of perfection. It has quite recently
been the subject of an elaborate study by the most eminent
mediævalist of our time, the late Léopold Delisle, who cannot restrain
his admiration for its regularity, its accuracy and finish, and the
extraordinary range and rapidity of its work. The documents issued in
the name of Henry II during his long reign of thirty-five years, says
31
Delisle, “both for his English and his continental possessions, are all
drawn up on the same plan in identical formulæ and expressed with
irreproachable precision in a simple, clear, and correct style, which is
also remarkably uniform save for a small number of pieces which show
the hand of others than the royal officers.” If the judgment of this
master required support, I should be glad to confirm it from the
personal examination of some hundreds of Henry’s charters and writs.
Such uniformity, it should be observed, is evidence not only of the
extent and technical attainments of the chancery but of substantially
similar administrative conditions throughout the various dominions to
which these documents are addressed: officers, functions, legal and
administrative procedure are everywhere very much alike. Moreover, a
study of these charters reveals another fact of fundamental
importance. Even more significant than uniformity of procedure in a
chancery is the type of document issued, for since the strength of
government lies not in legislation but in administration, a sure index of
a state’s efficiency will be found in the extent and character of its
administrative correspondence. This test places the Norman empire far
in advance of any of its contemporaries. Every payment from the
treasury, every allowance of an account, every summons to the army,
every executive command or prohibition, was made by formal royal
writ—per breve regis, as we read page after page in the account rolls.
Of the many thousands of such writs issued in Henry’s reign,
exceedingly few have come down to us, but no one can read these,
terse, direct, trained down to bone and muscle, without realizing the
keen minds and the clear-cut administrative methods which they
32
represent. Take an example:

H. Dei gratia rex Anglorum et dux Normannorum et


Aquitanorum et comes Andegavorum R. thesaurario et Willelmo
Malduit et Warino filio Giroldi camerariis suis salutem.
Liberate de thesauro meo xxv marcas fratribus Cartusie de
illis L marcis quas do eis annuatim per cartam meam.
Teste Willelmo de Sancte Marie Ecclesia. Apud Westmoster.

The purpose of these writs might, of course, vary—seize A of this land;


do right to B for that tenement; secure C in his possession; bring your
knights to such a place at such a time; summon twelve men to decide
D’s right;—but each has its appropriate form, which is always crisp and
exact. All speak the language of a strong, businesslike administration
which expected as a matter of course prompt and implicit obedience
throughout its broad dominions.
If such a system be given enough time, it will inevitably exert a
strong and persistent influence in favor of centralization and uniformity,
and it would be interesting to know just what was accomplished in
these directions during the half century of the Norman empire’s
existence. The parting advice which Henry had received from his
father Geoffrey was to avoid the transfer of customs and institutions
from one part of his realm to another, and the wisdom of the warning
was obvious under feudal conditions, if not in all imperial governments.
But there is a difference between the field of local custom and the
institutions of administration, and while even in matters of feudal law
there is some evidence of a generalization of certain reforms in the
rules of succession, in the conduct of government it was impossible to
keep the different parts of the empire in water-tight compartments so
long as there was a common administration and frequent interchange
of officials between different regions. We must remember that Henry
was a constant experimenter, and that if a thing worked well in one
place it was likely to be tried in another. Thus the Assize of Arms and
the ordinance for the crusading tithe were first promulgated for his
continental dominions, while the great English inquest of knights’ fees
in 1166 preceded by six years the parallel Norman measure. The great
struggle with Becket over the church courts seems to have had a
Norman prologue. The chronological order in any given case might
well be a matter of chance; but in administrative matters the influence
is likely to have travelled from the older and better organized to the
newer and more loosely knit dominions, from England, Normandy, and
Anjou on the one hand to Poitou, Aquitaine, and Gascony on the other.

* * * * *
Of Henry’s hereditary territories, Anjou seems the least important
from the point of view of constitutional influence. Much smaller in area
than either Normandy or England, it was a compact and comparatively
centralized state long before Henry’s accession, but the opportunity for
immediate action on the count’s part simplified its government to a
point where its experience was of no great value under Anglo-Norman
conditions. Certainly no Angevin influence is traceable in the field of
finance, and none seems probable in the administration of justice. In
the case of Normandy and England the resemblance of institutions is
closest, and a host of interesting problems present themselves which
carry us back to the effects of the Norman Conquest and even further.
It is, of course, one of the fundamental problems of English history
how far the government of England was Normanized in the century
following the Conquest. To a French scholar like Boutmy everything
begins anew in 1066, when “the line which the whole history of political
33
institutions has subsequently followed was traced and defined.” To
Freeman, on the other hand, the changes then introduced were
temporary and not fundamental. He is never tired of repeating that the
old English are the real English; progress comes by going back to the
principles of the Anglo-Saxon period and casting aside innovations
which have crept in in modern and evil times; “we have advanced by
falling back on a more ancient state of things, we have reformed by
calling to life again the institutions of earlier and ruder times, by setting
ourselves free from the slavish subtleties of Norman lawyers, by
casting aside as an accursed thing the innovations of Tudor tyranny
34
and Stewart usurpation.” The trend of present scholarly opinion lies
between these extremes. It refuses to throw away the Anglo-Saxon
period, whose institutions we are just beginning to read aright; but it
rejects its idealization at Freeman’s hands, who, it has been said, saw
all things “through a mist of moots and witans” and not as they really
were, and it finds more truth in Carlyle’s remark that the pot-bellied
equanimity of the Anglo-Saxon needed the drilling and discipline of a
35
century of Norman tyranny.
Whether he was needed much or little, the Norman drill-master
came and did his work, and when he had finished the two countries
were in many respects alike. He left his mark on the English language
and on English literature, which were submerged for three centuries
under the French of the court, the castle, and the town, and in the
process were permanently modified into a mixed speech. He left his
mark on architecture in the great cathedrals of the Norman bishops
and the massive castles with their Norman keeps. He made England a
feudal society, however far it may have gone in that direction before,
and its law, from that day to this, a feudal law. And he remade the
central government under the strong hand of a masterful dynasty
which compelled its subjects to will what the king willed. Whatever
permanence we may assign to Anglo-Saxon local institutions,—and we
cannot help granting them this in considerable measure,—it is not now
held that there was any notable Anglo-Saxon influence upon the
central administration. At best England before the Conquest was a
loose aggregation of tribal commonwealths divided by local feeling and
by the jealousies of the great earls, and its kingship did not grow
stronger with process of time. The national assembly of wise men,
whose persistence Freeman labored in vain to prove, became the
feudal council of the Norman barons, and this council, the curia regis,
and the royal household which was its permanent nucleus, became the
starting-point of a new constitutional development which produced the
House of Lords, the courts of law, and the great departments of the
central administration.

* * * * *
Yet in a vigorous state central and local are never wholly
separable, and it is where they touch that recent study has been able
to show some continuity of development between the two periods,
namely in the fiscal system which culminated in the exchequer of the
English kings. Of all the institutions of the Anglo-Norman state, none is
more important and none more characteristic than the exchequer,
illustrating as it does at the same time the comparative wealth of the
sovereigns and the efficient conduct of their government. Nowhere in
western Europe did a king receive so large a revenue as here;
nowhere was it collected and administered in so regular and
businesslike a fashion; nowhere do the accounts afford so complete a
view of “the whole framework of society.” The main features of this
system are simple and striking.
In every administrative district of Normandy and England the king
had an agent—in England the sheriff, in Normandy the vicomte or bailli
—to collect his revenues, which consisted chiefly of the income from
lands and forests, the fees and fines in the royal courts, the proceeds
of the various feudal incidents, and the various payments which there
were from time to time levied under the name of Danegeld, scutage,
aid, or gift. Twice a year, at Easter and Michaelmas, these agents were
required to come to the treasury and render their accounts to the king’s
officers. At Easter the sheriff was expected to pay in half of his
receipts, receiving therefor down to 1826 a receipt in the form of a
notched stick or tally, split down the middle so that there was exact
agreement between the portion retained at the exchequer and the
portion carried off by the sheriff to be produced when the accounts of
the year were settled at Michaelmas. The great session of the
exchequer at Michaelmas was a very important occasion and is
described for us in detail in a most interesting contemporary treatise,
the Dialogue on the Exchequer, written by Richard the King’s
Treasurer, in 1178–79. There the sheriff met the great officials of the
king’s household who were also the great officers of the Anglo-Norman
state—the justiciar, chancellor, constable, treasurer, chamberlains, and
marshal, reënforced by clerks, tally-cutters, calculators, and other
assistants. The place and the institution took their names from a
chequered table or chess-board—the Latin name scaccarium means a
chess-board—in size and shape not unlike a billiard table, covered
with cloth which was ruled off into columns for pence, shillings,
pounds, hundreds and thousands of pounds. On one side were set
forth in this graphic manner the sums which the sheriff was required to
pay, on the other he and his clerk tried to offset these with tallies,
receipts, warrants, and counters representing actual cash. Played with
skill and care on each side, for the stakes were high, this great match
was likened to a game of chess between the sheriff and the king’s
officers. Its results were recorded each year, district by district and item
by item, on a great roll, called the pipe roll from the pipes, or skins of
parchment sewed end to end, of which it was made up. For England
we have an unbroken series of these rolls from the second year of
Henry II, as well as an odd roll of Henry I, constituting a record of
finance and government quite unique in contemporary Europe. The
series was doubtless as complete for Normandy, but there survive
from Henry’s reign only the roll of 1180 and fragments of that of 1184.
For the other Plantagenet lands nothing remains.
This remarkable fiscal system comprised accordingly a regular
method of collecting revenue, a central treasury and board of account,
and a distinctive and careful mode of auditing the accounts. There was
nothing like it north of Sicily, and contemporaries admired it both for its
administrative efficiency and for the wealth and resources which it
implied. Although something of the sort seems to have existed in all
the territories of the Plantagenet empire and the different bodies seem
to have maintained a certain amount of coöperation, all our records
come from England and Normandy, and there can be no question that
it is distinctively an Anglo-Norman institution. Whether, however, it is
English or Norman in origin and how it came into existence, are still in
many respects obscure questions. The exchequer is not an innovation
of Henry II, for the surviving roll of Henry I and certain incidental
evidence show that it existed on both sides of the Channel in the reign
of his grandfather. In the time of the author of the Dialogue there was a
tradition that it had been imported from Normandy by William the
Conqueror, but this must be discounted by the fact that certain
elements of the system can be traced in Anglo-Saxon England. The
truth is that the exchequer is a complicated institution, some parts of
which may be quite ancient and the results of parallel development on
both sides of the Channel; at least the problem of priority has reached
no certain solution. Its most characteristic feature, however, its peculiar
method of reckoning, does not seem either of Norman or English
origin, but derived from the abacus of the ancient Romans, as used
and taught in the continental schools of the eleventh and twelfth
centuries.
One who tries to perform with Roman numerals a simple problem
in addition or subtraction—or better yet, in multiplication or division—
will have no difficulty in understanding why people unacquainted with
the Arabic system of notation have had recourse to a counting-
machine or abacus. The difficulty, of course, lies not so much in the
clumsy form of the individual Roman numbers as in the absence of the
zero and the reckoning by position which it makes possible. This
defect the abacus supplied. By means of a sanded board or a cloth-
covered table or a string of counters it provided a row of columns each
of which represented a decimal group—units, tens, hundreds, etc.—by
which numerical operations could be rapidly and accurately performed.
Employed by the ancient Romans, as by the modern Chinese, the
arithmetic of the abacus became a regular subject of instruction in the
schools of the Middle Ages, whence its reckoning was introduced into
the operations of the Anglo-Norman treasury. The most recent student
of the subject, Reginald Lane Poole, connects the change with the
Englishmen who studied at the cathedral school of Laon early in the
twelfth century. To me it seems somewhat earlier, brought by abacists
who came to England in the eleventh century from the schools of
36
Lorraine. In either case its introduction was much more than a
change of bookkeeping. Convenient as such reckoning was in general,
it was the only possible method for men who could neither read nor
write, like the Anglo-Norman sheriffs and many of the royal officers,
and its use made it possible to carry on the fiscal business of the state
on a large scale, in an open and public fashion, with full justice to all
parties, and with accuracy, certainty, and dispatch. It was a
businesslike system for busy and businesslike men.

* * * * *
In the history of judicial administration the personal initiative of
Henry II is more evident than in finance. The king had an especial
fondness for legal questions and often participated in their decision,
yet his influence was exerted particularly to develop a system of courts
and judges which could work in his absence and without his

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